Sweet Sisters,
You know how you read verses in the Bible over and over and one day you read a verse you’ve read a hundred times and it jumps out at you in a new and amazing way you’ve never seen before? I had that experience this week during the Wednesday night Bible class I attended.
The class was on Mark 4. In the first 20 verses, Jesus tells the parable of the sower. In Mark, this is not a parable on evangelism, but a parable about the condition of our hearts.
It was verses 20 and 25 that the teacher helped me see in a whole new way! Let me show them to you and then I will tell you what I learned. I want you to see them in the NIV version and also in the TPT version.
NIV:
20 Others, like seed sown on good soil, hear the word, accept it, and produce a crop—some thirty, some sixty, some a hundred times what was sown.” 25 Whoever has will be given more; whoever does not have, even what they have will be taken from them.”
TPT
20“But what is sown on good soil represents those who open their hearts to receive the message and their lives bear good fruit—some yield a harvest of thirty, sixty, even a hundredfold!” 25 For those who listen with open hearts will receive more revelation. But those who don’t listen with open hearts will lose what little they think they have!”
The teacher pointed out that we need to be very careful to pay attention to what Jesus is telling us in these verses. What we do with the teachings of Jesus is important. The more we try to apply His teachings the more we will benefit, but if we chose not to take advantage of them, we risk losing them.
I love how the TPT version translates verse 25; For those who listen with open hearts will receive more revelation.
Do I come to God’s word with an open heart? Am I willing to lay aside my preconceived ideas and opinions and just let God “speak” to me?
Do you know what revelation means? Oxford Dictionary defines revelation as; “a surprising and previously unknown fact, especially one that is made known in a dramatic way.”
I am reminded of two of my favorite passages from the Psalms.
Psalm 130:5
I wait for the Lord, my whole being waits,
and in his word I put my hope.
Psalm 25:4 – 5
4
Show me your ways, Lord,
teach me your paths.5
Guide me in your truth and teach me,
for you are God my Savior,
and my hope is in you all day long.
In both of these passages, the Psalmist is asking God to show him through his words, what he wants him to do.
Another concept that jumped out at me from this passage in Mark is that God wants me to take what He teaches me and bear fruit. Look back at Luke 4:20. It says that the seed planted on good soil produced a crop.
John 15 talks a lot about bearing fruit. In verse five Jesus says;
5 “I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.
In verse eight Jesus says;
8 This is to my Father’s glory, that you bear much fruit, showing yourselves to be my disciples.
In verse 16 Jesus says:
16 You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you so that you might go and bear fruit—fruit that will last—and so that whatever you ask in my name the Father will give you.
We learn from these verses that
1). We cannot bear fruit apart from Jesus
2). When we bear fruit, we show we are Jesus’ disciples
3). Jesus chose us that we might bear fruit for Him
Paul talks about bearing fruit in Colossians 1:10:
10 so that you may live a life worthy of the Lord and please him in every way: bearing fruit in every good work, growing in the knowledge of God
Paul says that when we bear fruit, we are living a life worthy of the Lord and that it pleases Him.
Maybe you are wondering what it looks like to bear fruit? We know that when we are baptized the Spirit comes to live within us.
Acts 2:38
38 Peter replied, “Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. And you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit.
Jesus also promised in John 14:26 that He would send the Helper, the Holy Spirit to teach us.
26 But the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, whom the Father will send in my name, will teach you all things and will remind you of everything I have said to you.
In Galatians 5:22-23, Paul tells us what the fruit of the Spirit is.
22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23 gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law. 24 Those who belong to Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. 25 Since we live by the Spirit, let us keep in step with the Spirit. 26 Let us not become conceited, provoking and envying each other.
The Holy Spirit helps us to produce the kind of fruit that pleases God and shows those around us that we are His. I think it’s important to realize that we are all unique in the way the fruit of the Holy Spirit grows in each of our lives. Just like there are many varieties of apples and oranges, the fruit of the Spirit can look different in each of us but it will always look like Jesus.
I think it is also important to realize that producing fruit is a process. Remember in Mark 4:20, Jesus said that some produced 30, some 60, and some 100 times what was sown. Just do the best you can and let God do the rest.
We have a lime tree by our front porch. For years we would get half a dozen to maybe a dozen limes a year. A couple of years ago we hired a gardener. Now we get more limes than we can count. That’s how the Holy
Spirit works in our lives. He takes our willingness to produce what we can and multiplies it beyond what we can imagine!
Sweet Sisters, this is the time of the year that we plant flowers and vegetables. Let’s decide to cultivate fruit in our lives for Jesus too.
Debbie
APRIL 26, 2022
